Microsoft is square, Apple is roundrect, Google is...?

Clayton Miller's Interuserface takes a look at the iconic shapes behind today's biggest mobile companies, and while Apple, iPhone, and iPad are obviously roundrects (rounded rectangles), their competition is just as geometrically aligned:

Microsoft’s Metro UI owns the square. Apple has a corner on the roundrect, from the Springboard launcher to the iPhone hardware itself. Nokia, despite its late entry with MeeGo’s Harmattan UI, found the squircle unclaimed and ran with it beautifully. Palm has used the circle from the early days of PalmOS, and in WebOS, HP continues the tradition with care (one might even note that both Palm and HP structure their wordmarks around the circle).

Zune, obviously, couldn't hold the squircle, and neither Bada nor RIM could take the square or roundrect as their own. Interestingly, Google's Android has no iconic hold on any simple shape (nor do Facebook or Amazon for that matter, who have elected to stick with letters).

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Reader comments

Microsoft is square, Apple is roundrect, Google is...?

Whats funny is I asked a legit question about google being all "open" and the android users got all offended and started to freak out. I mean I own an android phone but I would never freak out.....
At least with Apple users you ask a question and most of the time they answer you like an adult.

Square = Rectangle
Rectangle != Square
A rectangle is a four sided shape that has two sides parallel to each other, and the other two parallel to each other.
A square is a four sided shape with all four sides being equal in length.
Technically, the article is correct.

You are right. The guy I had a argument with was 13 years old. It was funny. It was on facebook and he deleted my question after he took a screenshot of it and then said I deleted it.
Its sort of the reason why I want to get an iPhone. Can't stand android users and don't want to be apart of the,